Prussia German Kriegsnagelung

[Odulf]

In all the nations at war, strong patriotic sentiments were promoted to fund the war. In this perspective, most governments sold War Bonds. But also the national Red Cross organizations and Christian or other welfare institutes were keen to collect money to fund their care for soldiers, sailors and civilians. This was done by the sale of postcards, street or house-to-house collections, fund raising manifestations etc.

In Germany, a particular home front form of fundraising was called KRIEGSNAGELUNG, which is best translated as: Nails for the War. Participants could buy (symbolical) a nail which was hammered into an object, generally this was made of (German) oak and took the shape of an Iron Cross, a Warrior, a Shield with a crest or a Column. The benefits were funding the Kriegsopferwerk, the care for the German victims of war such as invalids, casualties and their families. Interesting to note, it that also communities of Germans and Austrians in the USA put up similar projects; an Iron Cross was nailed in San Francisco and a Shield with German Eagle in Baltimore.

In Kiel (where at the well-known Germania Werft many U-Boats were built) the Vaterländische Frauen-Verein (Patriotic Women’s Society) and the Red Cross put up a huge wooden U-Boat to be “nailed”, starting from 22 September 1915.

Obviously, spenders received a small paper scroll (13 x 17 cm), an Urkunde, to certificate their patriotism.

For those of you who understand German, this may be an interesting article: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kriegsnagelungen

From my collection, the Kiel document and a postcard of the U-Boat

[Jock Auld]

Odulf,

Very interesting and very unusual I would think for the scroll to have survived.

Cool.

Jock

[Odulf]

Odulf,

Very interesting and very unusual I would think for the scroll to have survived.

Cool.

Jock

Yep, and I am curious if any other certificates or tokes (pins, paper badges, post-cards, or such like) have been issued to similar nailings...

I have found nothing about this with the dealers.... Have these (possible) tokens been rejected, ignored, been regarded unimportant and uncollectable?

These are all tokens of history, to my opinion, but perhaps not to be regarded as "militaria"...

Fact is, that about of some of these nailing-memorabilia postcards were produced, and some of these are very rare (and expensive).

Edited November 17, 2014 by Odulf